The present invention relates to tone control apparatus and methods for controlling generation of tones while imparting various types of rendition styles (or articulation) to musical tones, or voices or other desired sounds in response to operation by a user, as well as computer programs for such tone generation. More particularly, the present invention relates to an improved tone control apparatus and method, which, in response to operation, by a user, of only a same operator, can control tone generation in real time while imparting the tones with any of a plurality of different release rendition styles (or attack rendition styles) that faithfully express tone color variations specific to natural musical instruments or tone color variations based on various types of articulation, as well as a computer program for such tone generation. The present invention can be extensively applied to not only electronic musical instruments but also all fields of other equipment, apparatus and methods, such as automatic performance apparatus, computers, electronic game apparatus and other multimedia equipment, which have functions of generating tones, voices or other desired sounds.
Today, various apparatus are known which are intended to achieve realistic reproduction and control of various rendition styles etc. that faithfully express tone color variations specific to natural musical instruments or tone color variations based on various types of articulation. Among examples of such apparatus is one that employs a tone waveform control technique commonly known as “SAEM” (Sound Articulation Element Modeling), which is disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Publication No. 2004-78095 corresponding to the US2004-0055449 A1. In the apparatus employing the SAEM technique, whole waveforms corresponding to various rendition styles are prestored for individual partial sections, such as attack, release and body sections, of a tone, so that the tone can be formed by time-serially combining the prestored waveforms for the partial sections. Let it now be assumed that the term “tone” is used in this specification to refer to not only a musical tone but also a voice or any other type of sound.
With the conventionally-known technique, it is possible for the user to control tone generation while imparting tones with rendition styles, by appropriately operating any of a plurality of rendition style designating operators assigned to various rendition styles. For release-related rendition styles (i.e., release rendition styles), for example, rendition style designating operators (e.g., switches and/or pedals), functioning like rendition style switches, are assigned to various different release rendition styles, and generation of a tone can be controlled, through appropriate ON/OFF operation of any one of the rendition style designating operators, such that the tone is silenced (or released) by being imparted with the corresponding release rendition style. Similarly, for attack rendition styles, rendition style designating operators are assigned to various attack release rendition styles, and generation of a tone can be controlled, through appropriate ON/OFF operation of any one of the attack rendition style designating operators, such that the tone starts to be audibly generated (i.e., sounded) by being imparted with the corresponding attack rendition style. Namely, in the case where a release rendition style or attack rendition style is imparted by identifying only the ON or OFF state of the corresponding rendition style designating operator, there are provided a multiplicity of operators for selecting any desired one of a plurality of different release rendition styles, and thus the user has to appropriately select and operate a necessary one of the multiplicity of rendition style designating operators. However, it is extremely difficult for the user to control generation of tones while selecting and operating, at appropriate timing, the necessary rendition style designating operators, in addition to executing performance operation by operating a performance operator unit, such as a keyboard. Consequently, with the conventionally-known technique, it has been difficult for the user to play the performance operator unit while imparting release or attack rendition styles in real time.